CPS report card shows many schools struggling

By Chicago Public Schools' own reckoning, about a quarter of its elementary schools and more than 40 percent of its high schools are failing, according to internal documents obtained by the Tribune.

Each year, district officials score each school based on academic performance. Last year, they assigned grades A through F based on the numeric scores, and schools chief Ron Huberman talked of publicly releasing them so school and community members would know where they stood. But he never did.

An analysis of the grades shows that a disproportionate number of schools scored in the D range or worse, including 48 percent of elementaries and 68 percent of high schools.

Many critics have labeled the district as failing over the years, and individual schools have continuously failed to meet standards under the federal No Child Left Behind Act. What's novel about this measure is that it offers a glimpse of the district's own view of school quality. It's important, too, because Huberman last year pushed for those scores to be tied to decisions about closings — the highest sanction a school can face.

Huberman said he did not release the grades because they need to be more nuanced. The data does not take individual student growth into account, and school-wide comparisons can be imperfect, he said.

He also wanted a plan in place for schools to improve their grades before publicly releasing them, he said.

Even so, Huberman pushed to use the same scores to justify closing schools.

"It's not that I think it's flawed, but I think it can be better and more nuanced," he said.

The ratings take in a variety of indicators including test scores, dropout rates and attendance. The scores are based on 2008-2009 test results as well as trends over time.

The CPS document obtained by the Tribune was prepared in conjunction with consultants at The Parthenon Group. It shows the grade ranges that corresponded with the numeric scores.

The grades skew toward the lower end of the spectrum. Among elementary schools, 47 of 474 received As, while just 4 of 92 high schools met that mark. Meanwhile, 104 elementary schools and 39 high schools got Fs. Not all schools had sufficient data to be scored.

What the grades mean depends on where you sit.

District officials say they want to give fair warning when schools are at risk of closure.

But a few activists accuse Huberman of using the probation policy to wrestle control from local school councils, since schools on probation for two years can also lose the authority to hire their own principals.

More than 300 schools are on probation this year, the highest number since 1996-1997, according to an analysis conducted by Designs for Change, an education nonprofit.

"Probation has become a back-door method … for recentralizing the school system to strip Local School Councils, principals and teachers of their decision-making opportunities," wrote Valenica Rias-Winstead, an associate at the research group, in a February report.

Others see the grades as sad confirmation that billions of dollars and decades of reform have yielded little more than higher property taxes in the city. The data is from the 14th — and what will likely be the penultimate — year that Mayor Richard M. Daley controls the school system.

Observers caution that a single grade can't assess the complex work of fashioning the school system into a functioning body.

"There has to be some recognition — beyond what letter grades are put on school doors — of just how complicated this work is," said Timothy Knowles, director of the University of Chicago Urban Education Institute. "Changing the quality of teaching, improving the quality of learning and having extraordinary leaders is at the heart of the answer. And that doesn't happen in one school year."

Some worry that, grim as these figures are, they still soft-pedal the truth — particularly when it comes to the youngest students.

The state test for elementary schools is not as difficult as the high school exam, which is partly based on the college entrance ACT exam. This disparity in rigor helps explain why so many more high schools fail: students simply aren't prepared for the 11th grade test.

"At the elementary level, state assessment standards have been so weakened that most of the 8th-graders who 'meet' these standards have little chance to succeed in high school or to be ready for college," wrote the Civic Committee of the Commercial Club of Chicago in a 2009 report.

The grades don't always match parents' assessments of how their school is doing.

Valisala Donerson has three children at Westcott Elementary in the Chatham neighborhood. In recent years, she has been enthusiastic about the school's energy, its after-school programs and new teachers. She was startled to find the school had earned a D- for the last two years, this year hovering just above an F.

"The school, they're really trying and encouraging the kids to come back to school to keep them busy," she said.

But while Donerson isn't pleased with her school's grade, its simple format and comparability is tough medicine she can swallow.

But scores are not always straightforward, another reason the district held off on releasing them.

At Miles Davis Magnet Academy, state test scores took a nose dive after the school was consolidated with an underperforming middle school last school year. It received an F.

Ella Nevels, grandmother of three students at Davis, blames the school's administration and a lack of resources for souring the school's performance. So while she's not surprised by the grade, she doesn't see much use for it.

"They need to grade this state and this city," snarled Nevels.

Daley took control of the school district in 1995, after it was dubbed "worst in the nation" by then-Secretary of Education William Bennett. Under the provisions of the takeover legislation, Daley was allowed to appoint the head of the district and the school board.

A major component of his education agenda has been closing the lowest-performing schools. Closing announcements often struck schools with little warning, touching off a firestorm of protest.

After the last two years of vitriolic response to closing or overhauling 19 schools, Huberman decided to revamp the process. Schools would still be closed, he said, but only if there was a better alternative for the affected kids. And officials would pay close attention to safety concerns, knowing that neighborhood mixing could prompt gang conflicts.

But those changes didn't address an issue that remained vexing to some leaders: Why were people fighting to keep open schools where passing rates floated in the single digits?

To better inform parents, the district this year launched the Family and Community Engagement office to try and temper the fiery opposition.

Created by Chief Administrative Officer Robert Runcie, it will send staffers to four areas that are riddled with probationary schools: Humboldt Park, Austin, Grand Boulevard and Englewood.

Still in its infancy, the team plansto help the communities leverage their resources to improve schools and neighborhoods, says Runcie. It wants to create leadership councils to help strategize and inform the community about school issues. The plan is to start with about a dozen schools in each area.

"We want to get the community and get the players at the table and get them to a point where they can collaborate," said Runcie.

Gregory Washington, head of the Grand Boulevard Federation, agrees that underperforming schools need to be dealt with, but he can't help feeling skeptical about this newest push.

"One of the things they say they want to do is involve parents and community more and get them more accurate information," he said. "If that rhetoric turns into reality then that's a positive approach."